Players that just had "game"

[ford82]

Doron Sheffer

 

[Vancat]

Earl Kelley!

 

[Rocktheworld]

Ray Allen aka Jesus Shuttlesworth, DUH

 

[huskypantz]

No Donny Marshall reference? Donny was a guy who did not have any one incredible skill. He pretty much just worked hard and built himself into an excellent college player and got a cup of coffee in the NBA. Always had great effort and determination, that helped him grow over his career.

 

[johnhuskies95]

El-Amin.

 

[superjohn]

I've always said Jake Voskuhl is one of if not the most underrated players at UConn. He was our best screener ever, great position defense, good rebounder, help defender etc. Jake didn't have much offensive skill but he made up for it by doing everything else well, just a great intangibles player and winner.

 

[Huskies4ever]

Mr. Onions, Rashad Anderson. His swagger, dagger(s), and personality contributed mightily to the 2004 'ship.

 

[JaYnYcE]

The best athlete thread got me thinking of this. Which players had the most "game"? By that I mean they weren't necessarily the best shooter or dribbler or dunker or athlete or defender, but they just had mad game. Maybe it was force of personality or smarts or just gymrattness, but they could just play. These are the kind of guys that look much better playing in a game than they probably did in practice.

1) Chris Smith - is there any debate? Look at some of the rosters he took to the NCAA tournament, but he wasn't good enough at anything in particular to hang on more than a handful of years as a backup in the NBA.

2) KEA - how does a guy that is 25 pounds overweight with a 5' wingspan dominate like he did?

3) Bazz - he has some big measurable skills, particularly with his shooting, but the whole is certainly much, much bigger than the sum of his component parts.

4) Henefeld - there were games where he would have a very thin stat sheet and still seem to dominate. Turned a bubble team into a Dream Season.

5) KFree - no one worked harder and seemed to do more with modest natural ability and skill than KFree. It was certainly a little dusty in my living room the afternoon he walked off the court for the last time into Calhoun's arms.

6) Selvie - how was an undersized guy that was an OK athlete by Big East standards such an instrumental part of a team that was a Steve Blake 3 away from the Final 4? He was a complete black hole offensively, but he scored with a high shooting percentage and rebounded well.


Who am I missing?

Guys not on the list:

Scheffer - very quick first step and he was tall. Smart player, but the funky shot actually held him back. This was a guy that had all the pieces to be a star college player, and he was.

Tate - tall guard that was a decent athlete if not super fast.

Kemba - Everyone knew Kemba was going to be a star.

Marcus Williams

 

[joober jones]

+1 on Donny Marshall

 

[CTBasketball]

Jeff Adrien.

And I think people on here put too much value into Jerome Dyson's senior season - he was a great Husky all around. A terrific player from his frosh - junior seasons. HE WASN'T A POINT GUARD!

 

[elduderino]

By "Game" I assume you mean the crafty/savvy/know-how that overcomes physical limitations.

C: Tyler Olander - I'm not going to beat up on Tyler here. He is a two-time NCAA CHampion, for F86k's sake. I won't mention his inability to rebound or be in shape. I won't mention his world-class penchant for picking up cheap and-1 fouls. I won't mention that he was so uncoordinated that he failed a sobriety test while stone-sober. I kid, I kid. But he belongs on this list.

can you tell work is slow today?

If KEA's one superlative, lowest center of gravity for a D1 Nat'l Champion, can be overlooked, hes hands down my pick. I just loved watching him make infinitely more conditioned, better athletes look foolish with his head, double chin, then jowl fakes. Although I think M Williams, Adrien, Freeman, and the Israelis are up there too.

The Olander quip was hysterical, no kidding.

 

[huskypantz]

If KEA's one superlative, lowest center of gravity for a D1 Nat'l Champion, can be overlooked, hes hands down my pick. I just loved watching him make infinitely more conditioned, better athletes look foolish with his head, double chin, then jowl fakes. Although I think M Williams, Adrien, Freeman, and the Israelis are up there too.

The Olander quip was hysterical, no kidding.

You had me at "jowl fakes".

 

[Tenspro2002]

I interpret "game" as being somewhere in the neighborhood of basketball IQ.

Is it too late to sneak Bazz into this discussion?

 

[UconnU]

I always thought Marcus Johnson was going to be a stud... he showed flashes but never panned out for us. After he transfered he had some success if I remember correctly?

 

[FeedTheDove]

I think many in this thread are misinterpreting the meaning of "game." I take the meaning as a combination of basketball IQ, savviness, and overall skill. These types of players have tricks up their sleeves in order to produce in games. They'll sometimes pull out "playground" type moves to abuse the defense.

With this definition, the first player that comes to my mind is Bazz. While he doesn't have blazing speed or unreal athleticism, he often uses his basketball IQ and skill to get in the lane or get fouled. Just my opinion.

I love the Marcus Williams mention up top - perfect for this type of thread.

 

[Greathusky]

The best athlete thread got me thinking of this. Which players had the most "game"? By that I mean they weren't necessarily the best shooter or dribbler or dunker or athlete or defender, but they just had mad game. Maybe it was force of personality or smarts or just gymrattness, but they could just play. These are the kind of guys that look much better playing in a game than they probably did in practice.

1) Chris Smith - is there any debate? Look at some of the rosters he took to the NCAA tournament, but he wasn't good enough at anything in particular to hang on more than a handful of years as a backup in the NBA.

2) KEA - how does a guy that is 25 pounds overweight with a 5' wingspan dominate like he did?

3) Bazz - he has some big measurable skills, particularly with his shooting, but the whole is certainly much, much bigger than the sum of his component parts.

4) Henefeld - there were games where he would have a very thin stat sheet and still seem to dominate. Turned a bubble team into a Dream Season.

5) KFree - no one worked harder and seemed to do more with modest natural ability and skill than KFree. It was certainly a little dusty in my living room the afternoon he walked off the court for the last time into Calhoun's arms.

6) Selvie - how was an undersized guy that was an OK athlete by Big East standards such an instrumental part of a team that was a Steve Blake 3 away from the Final 4? He was a complete black hole offensively, but he scored with a high shooting percentage and rebounded well.


Who am I missing?

Guys not on the list:

Scheffer - very quick first step and he was tall. Smart player, but the funky shot actually held him back. This was a guy that had all the pieces to be a star college player, and he was.

Tate - tall guard that was a decent athlete if not super fast.

Kemba - Everyone knew Kemba was going to be a star.

I have to add Ben Gordon. He did some amazing stuff off the dribble and was balls-on accurate from 3 point land.

 

[epark88]

Lyman DePriest.

Dude could guard four positons easily - I personally watched him lock down Dana Barros twice. Didn't show much offense, but he really didn't need to...

 

[Horatio]

Tony "Super Tone" Robertson . Dude had game , was solid and just looked cool
On the court ( braids or afro ) . It was like Uconn basketball meets the " Boondocks" with a little Wu - Tang. One of my favorites.

 

[Pudge]

Khalid El-Amin came into a Shoe camp and blew everyone away. Long before he showed up in Storrs and wore National Flag Blue & White.

The KID dominated a superior athletic camp of studs nationally. Now ... we look at that frame today & I suppose many of us can't imagine that KEA. But, he did it with WILL ... with savvy ... with super-competitiveness ... and he transcended that set of skills into a Team. I think we are forgetting some of the history here.

Who else? Gosh we had so many who just WILL prevailed on a court. Nadav took over games for a stretch. And that momentum he generated built in with all the others on the floor.

Those are my 2.

 

[noeynox]

Lyman DePriest.

Dude could guard four positons easily - I personally watched him lock down Dana Barros twice. Didn't show much offense, but he really didn't need to...

Could throw down some serious dunks. One on the break at Conte Forum stands out. Took off one step inside the free throw line and threw it down with two hands. Also one of the most unassuming athletes you could ever meet. Nice guy.

 

[CAHUSKY]

Chris Smith and Henefeld were before my time but I don't get Bazz or KEA being included here, .

Agree on Bazz but Khalid would be in the hall of fame of guys who "just had game". He's built like me (not a compliment), smoked pot like my brother (not a compliment as he's a huge stoner) and looked more like a 50 year old man than a college basketball player.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

I think many in this thread are misinterpreting the meaning of "game." I take the meaning as a combination of basketball IQ, savviness, and overall skill. These types of players have tricks up their sleeves in order to produce in games. They'll sometimes pull out "playground" type moves to abuse the defense.

With this definition, the first player that comes to my mind is Bazz. While he doesn't have blazing speed or unreal athleticism, he often uses his basketball IQ and skill to get in the lane or get fouled. Just my opinion.

I love the Marcus Williams mention up top - perfect for this type of thread.

It's the savviness, IQ, skill, mojo. It's the step back and the leaners and the drop steps and finger rolls and changing speeds with the ball so that a guy like Marcus or KEA with modest speed can look blazing fast because they just went from 50% to 100%. It's the holding the pass on the break to the absolute last millisecond to force the defender to commit before he drops a dime. It's doubling on defense just in time instead of a split second too late. It's more instinctual, learned through 10,000 pickup games than technical.

Sheffer was one of the soundest technical players, other than his shot, that UConn has ever had. Same with Ollie (also other than his shot). Ray Allen's and Ben Gordon's games were practically out of a textbook on basketball. Chris Smith's was not. KEA's was not. Selvie was most definitely not. They had funky games.

Tony Robertson is also one of my favorite all time Huskies. He was a supreme athlete and he definitely had style, but he didn't have "game" like these other guys. When he played well, it was because he was probably the fastest from end to end to ever to wear a UConn uniform and because when he jumped it was like he was shot out of a cannon. But he didn't do a lot of the little things that a Marcus Williams or Chris Smith did to steal games that we were going to lose.

 

[Danzz]

Rashad

 

[UConn9604]

The best athlete thread got me thinking of this. Which players had the most "game"? By that I mean they weren't necessarily the best shooter or dribbler or dunker or athlete or defender, but they just had mad game. Maybe it was force of personality or smarts or just gymrattness, but they could just play. These are the kind of guys that look much better playing in a game than they probably did in practice.

1) Chris Smith - is there any debate? Look at some of the rosters he took to the NCAA tournament, but he wasn't good enough at anything in particular to hang on more than a handful of years as a backup in the NBA.

2) KEA - how does a guy that is 25 pounds overweight with a 5' wingspan dominate like he did?

3) Bazz - he has some big measurable skills, particularly with his shooting, but the whole is certainly much, much bigger than the sum of his component parts.

4) Henefeld - there were games where he would have a very thin stat sheet and still seem to dominate. Turned a bubble team into a Dream Season.

5) KFree - no one worked harder and seemed to do more with modest natural ability and skill than KFree. It was certainly a little dusty in my living room the afternoon he walked off the court for the last time into Calhoun's arms.

6) Selvie - how was an undersized guy that was an OK athlete by Big East standards such an instrumental part of a team that was a Steve Blake 3 away from the Final 4? He was a complete black hole offensively, but he scored with a high shooting percentage and rebounded well.


Who am I missing?

Guys not on the list:

Scheffer - very quick first step and he was tall. Smart player, but the funky shot actually held him back. This was a guy that had all the pieces to be a star college player, and he was.

Tate - tall guard that was a decent athlete if not super fast.

Kemba - Everyone knew Kemba was going to be a star.

Interesting thread, we can never win without these players.

The one who has to be on the list (in my opinion)? Kevin Ollie. Other than being arguably the fastest player with the ball in our history, he had no real outstanding skill except his work ethic, yet those last two teams he was on (1993-94, 1994-95) were dominant.

 

[Palatine]

Al Weston